Day: February 6, 2016

It is said every human being craves community, and I think this is so. Nearly two decades ago, when I moved to the country, I met Dennis and Debbie Yushak who own a grocery store in tiny Shushan, N.Y. Yushak’s has become somewhat famous around here for the quality of the meat they sell, people and restaurants come here from far away to buy the meat that Dennis Yushak prepares and sells.

Debbie runs the grocery store. I used to come in every day for food, then moved away to the big farm in West Hebron. I lost touch with Yushak’s, a much loved community center in Shushan and nearby towns. Fate has its own ideas about community. Last night, Maria and I went to the Round House Cafe for pizza and Dennis and Debbie were there with one of their sons.

It was wonderful to see them again, they came into my life when I was just beginning to live in the country, and helped me understand it and love it. I was happy to see them again, and resolved to start going there again, it is close by our new farm. I can’t even say why I haven’t been in, there is a painfully shy part of me, most people don’t see it, but it is there.

This morning, my friend Scott Carrino called and asked a favor, he was a bit overwhelmed and not feeling great. Did I have time before my class to deliver some fresh baked bread from the cafe to Dennis Yushak. Scott is not good at asking for help, I was happy to do it. I used to be famous, I joked, when I went to pick up the bread. So I hear, he laughed.  (All of the meat Scott uses in his food comes from Yushak’s, and the cafe even has signs proclaiming that.) I said sure, I had time.

I drove quickly to the cafe, picked up the bread (I had to pick up a turkey for the cafe in exchange). Debbie and Dennis were just coming to work, and Debbie was seeing her granddaughter Lucy. I met her other son and his wife, and it was kind of a flashback. I was reminded again of what community means, and of how I need to honor it. I am grateful to be back in touch with Yushak’s, you can look for photos from there.

Dennis came to work as I was leaving, we were both happy to see one another. Community is important to the Yushak’s, it is what they are about. I told Scott I am available for regular bread deliveries, I can use the money.

Cheryl e-mailed earlier the week to say she was trying a different kind of piece, a different kind of writing, she said she wasn’t prepared to bring it to class, it wasn’t ready. I urged her to bring it to class, to trust us, those pieces – the new ideas, the ones that aren’t ready – are most often the ones we need to share with others.

Many people ask me why I so strongly support writer’s sharing their work with others. One reason is that it is the best and only way I know of to learn and improve. When we write only for ourselves, it is hard to grow and mature as a writer, to be strong and confident. On my blog, I try many subjects for the first time an am quick to share them with my readers. I can’t do that in books, editors won’t permit it, marketers hate the idea.

Here, I have struggled to find my voice with many things, from spirituality to mysticism to love and suffering. My writing is sometimes raw and my thoughts incomplete, I share the process of growing and evolving. People do not object to this, even thought it is far from perfect, they learn and grow with me, take what they like, leave the rest behind. I do not need adoration or agreement, it is not the point.

Cheryl brought her very creative piece to class, it is about a widower thinking about a new relationship and about the appearance of a Cardinal, a bird associated with the spirits of the dead who appears outside of her window. There may or may not be a celibate Buddhist coming into the mix. Cheryl is a widower herself, she is thinking about life and relationships.

A cardinal, according to mythology, is a bird who speaks for the spirits of the dead. Cardinals, they say, appear when angels are near.

We all loved Cheryl’s very original and mystical idea, we were surprised and confused by it and first and then understood it and make some suggestions that excited her. She did not suffer from bringing a new and unfinished idea into the world, quite the opposite, she has a better sense of what she wants to say. The class has great ideas, almost every time, and a commitment to support and positive encouragement that is a spiritual experience in itself.

I am happy Cheryl brought us this piece, I can’t wait to see where she takes it. For me, writing is not a drama, but a process and a calling. Anyone can be a writer. Writers write, they take the sometimes fearful risk of making themselves vulnerable to the world. It is a cheap price to pay.

My writing class continues to do it’s extraordinary work, to listen to and support one another, and build confidence in the practice of writing. Ed Gulley is a dairy farmer and he is getting ready to launch his new blog – as yet unnamed.

“Hello!,” he wants to write on his first day, “I’m Ed Gully and after 63 years of loving and working on Bejosh Farm – 43 years of which are with my wife Carol at my side – father time has begun to show us subtle hints that slowing down and making changes should be considered.”

The blog,” he wrote, ” will be the Holy Grail for me to conquer due to the fact I still have a rotary phone that the grandkids are fascinated with and due to the fact that I am an old timer and stuck on some things from the past. But all kidding aside, we see stories and photos and great videos going on around us every day and they will be coming at some point and I hope you can bear with us.”

It will be a pleasure, I predict.

Ed and I are different in many ways, kindred spirits in another. Father time is hanging around me too, but you will not read any old people talk here, and I am not about slowing down. I doubt Ed will either. He is a big, roaring dynamo.

Like me, he sees this phase of life as a beginning, not an end. Life is, after all, what you make of it, at any age. He is focusing on his work as an artist, as his gifts as a writer and story-teller, and as a farmer who has lived and is living a rich and full and meaningful life.

Ed offered us in class a list of 10 different blog stories and issues he will raise, and I believe he will give me some real and exciting competition. My blog is called a Farm Journal, Ed’s blog is a rich farm and personal and agriculture testimony. The great blogs are not about issues, but about people, and Ed and Carol Gulley have a very powerful tale to tell.

Ed’s “junk art,” as he calls it, is coming into focus. “We have old guys like Timmy the Turtle and his box turtle brother; Mona the dustmop, a new creation from Carol; Gary The Goose and The Porcupine People.” Bejosh farm is a gallery already, this does not sound like slowing down to me.

It is a gift to have Ed in the class and to see this remarkable man and wife team grasp onto new technology to tell their story and move into the future. I’ll be sharing this journey. We are all born writers and artists, it is usually the adults in our lives who take this away from us. We can always get it back. Writing is not a magical or mystical art, it comes from life, emotion and the art. Many people in my class are showing that.

In the night, when the demons and spirits swirl around and I think of all the things I fear, the things I’ve suffered, the dangers in the world, I pause now and I think instead of the things I love about my life.

There is an art to loving my life. Like anything else that is worthwhile, it takes work and thought and patience and courage. This morning, I thought of Maria. Of our farm and life together. I thought of my writing and my photography. And of the new and precious friends I am making. I thought of the dogs and the animals here and of my blog.

I thought of my small town, my community, of the Round House Cafe, The Bog, the woman at my Rite-Aid who are so helpful to me. I thought of the deep forest, the woods, the hills, the light in the morning, my daughter in New York, the good carriage drivers who send me so many beautiful messages and wave to me when i walk in the park in New York.

I think of my Apple computer and my books and cameras, and of course, I think of me. If I can’t love me, I can’t love my life, and I am learning to love me, just as I am, the good me and the other me’s. And I think of the gift of teaching, of my class, where I am about to go this morning to share my Elixir. I suffer and tremble, like all of you, my life is not simple or perfect, nor would I wish it to be.

I love my typos and run-on sentences, they are all about my eagerness to write.

I love the people who read my books and my blog and send me the most wonderful messages and letters (P.O.Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816) they lift my spirits and remind me why I am on this earth. I am learning to love and be loved.

So this is my life and I love it, and I remind myself of that every morning. My friend Scott Carrino just called to interrupt this reverie and asked me if I would mind delivering some bread to Yushak’s market for him this morning. I love that he would ask me to do that, he is having a challenging day. On the way.